Habits & Mindsets

Students reference their teacher’s guidance in organization, study habits, character traits and values. They have internalized these traits beyond just talking about them which has led to personal growth on the part of the student.

INTRODUCTION

It is important for students of all ages to internalize traits that will lead to personal growth from adolescence through adulthood. As a transformational teacher, it is my job to ensure my students are developing not only study habits and academic success, but also vital character traits and values, such as the 16 Habits of Mind outlined by Arthur L. Costa and Bena Kallick (2009).

I first introduced the concept of habits and mindsets to my students as part of our novel study of A Long Walk to Water, focusing specifically on persisting, thinking interdependently, listening to others with understanding and empathy, and managing impulsivity. The students were explicitly taught what these habits were and were then asked to identify which Habits were used in different scenarios of refugee children (see documents below).

The document to the bottom left shows the explicit instructional materials I used to introduce these four habits of mind to the students. During the lesson, we first read through each definition of the four habits, stopping to discuss how they looked and sounded and why they were beneficial. Next, students participated in a gallery walk, see the images to the bottom right, in which students read short stories about refugee children and identified which habit of mind either was used or should have been used. Students used the original instructional materials to take their notes during this gallery walk, as seen in image 2 (bottom right). The class followed up the gallery walk with a whole group discussion about how the refugees in the stories either benefitted from using these habits how using the habits could have changed the outcomes for the refugees.

It is clear in looking through the student work to the left that while some students had a pretty good ability to identify these habits, there were still some students who struggled to make the connections. For example, Student Sample A, page 1, was only able to identify two of the four habits, and even then on a very basic level. This student identified that one refugee persisted by “[trying] hard to speak English and going to school” but was unable to really understand the other three habits. On the other hand, some students, such as Student Samples C and D, pages 3-4, were able to identify either the presence of or need for each habit. Most students, however, most compared to Student Sample B, correctly identifying two to three habits on a basic level.

Even with most of the students leaving this lesson with only a baseline level of knowledge about the habits, I felt it was successful in introducing the concept of the habits of mind, while also putting students in the right frame of mind to begin our novel study. When we began reading A Long Walk to Water and continued to reinforce these habits, the students had enough familiarity with them to dig deeper and begin to apply them more analytically in their coursework and internally in their own behaviors. Explore the sections below to see how I explicitly taught three of these habits to my students, as well as to evaluate the reinforcement activities I used to internalize these traits beyond just talking about them.

Reference

Costa, A.L., Kallick, B. Habits of Mind Across the Curriculum. Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, 2009.

Thinking Interdependently

In this section, I present the explicit instruction and reinforcement activities I used to teach my students how to think interdependently and work together.

Managing Impulsivity

This section explores the explicit instruction and reinforcement activities my students engaged in while learning what impulsiveness was and how to manage it.

Persisting

See this section to examine how my students explicitly learned about persistence and then reinforced their understanding through novel study and self-reflection.